Scrapies error is blamed on robot

However, this time they have blamed a robot handling samples in a laboratory. Under the national scrapie plan, scientists are trying to establish which kinds of sheep are most genetically prone to scrapie, which can theoretically mask BSE.

Genotype testing was in progress at two laboratories to find the vulnerable flocks. The Government is using the Animal Health Bill to force farmers to slaughter or castrate sheep prone to scrapie.

The laboratories got the scientific testing right. But the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said one laboratory had transferred the results to the wrong sheep. Some 350 blood tests on five farms were wrong.

The department said no animals were required to be slaughtered based on the incorrect results. Elliot Morley, the junior Defra minister, said the result proved the success of the quality control arrangements put in place to spot mistakes.

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But a department spokesman conceded that the error would have been more serious in a year when the Animal Health Bill has passed into law.

An investigation has identified a robot handling samples in one of the laboratories involved, the Laboratory of the Government Chemist, as being to blame. Defra said that the problem was caused by a software error.

Ironically, that laboratory identified that scientists were conducting tests for BSE on cows' brains rather than sheep's brains in October.

Peter Ainsworth, the Conservative environment, food and rural affairs spokesman, said the mistake showed that the Animal Health Bill was draconian.